Other cryptocurrencies, e.g. Litecoin use fixed Scrypt(1024, 1, 1) with SHA-256 and Salsa20 as hashing and mixing functions, respectively. This uses only 128 kB of memory per hash and so can be effectively implemented on parallel architectures like GPU and FPGA devices. However, Yacoin with its current value of N=32768 uses 4 MB of memory (no commecrially-available GPU has a compute unit local memory of this size, thus most data ends up in the much slower shared global memory).

The design intends to remove the possibility of mining the currency with any ASIC.[6] At predetermined intervals the software will automatically require more computer memory for mining.[7] Each time this occurs which will render any static, specialized mining circuits irrelevant. Every "N++ Event", as they are called, will also increase the difficulty rating for mining, which will decrease the block rewards.

It is also notable that Yacoin is the first cryptocurrency to use the scrypt hash algorithm as intended by its developer [8]

History

In early May 2013, a user on Bitcointalk.org named "pocopoco" announced the publication of the Yacoin software client.

In August 2013, another user named "sairon" ported the "Coin Control" feature to Yacoin.[9] It is intended to enable users to control which addresses are used for their transactions and can help conserve coin age and privacy.

Economics

Yacoin inherits a dynamic inflationary/deflationary behavior from Peercoin. The block rewards for Proof-of-Work mining are inversely proportional to the amount of computational power used, so the rewards will decrease when the currency is valued more.
Proof-of-stake minters are also rewarded with interest on the coins they own at a rate of 5% per year. However, there is a fixed transaction fee that destroys at least 0.01 YAC every time coins are transferred. This feature will gradually deflate the currency in proportion to its velocity. The cumulative effect of creating and destroying the currency is theoretically intended to stabilize the growth of its supply, while keeping it adaptable to demand and usage.

Criticism

Due to the way the reward is calculated, early miners got very large amount of the total amount of coins. A increase of value would decrease the block reward and make mining less profitable, this makes the coin very vulnerable to 51% attack. The fixed fee at 0.01 YAC would make it impossible to use if it gains value except for pyramid schemes.

Despite the claims from the developer the increase of the Nfactor doesn't prevent GPU mining and hence it doesn't differ from other altcoins.[10]